Bill Would Let Designated School Staff Carry Weapons

Thursday

Feb 28, 2013 at 4:29 PM

A Southwest Florida state lawmaker has filed a bill that would allow school principals to designate trained staff members to carry concealed weapons, a response to the Connecticut elementary school massacre.

By LEE WILLIAMSSARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE

A Southwest Florida state lawmaker has filed a bill that would allow school principals to designate trained staff members to carry concealed weapons, a response to the Connecticut elementary school massacre.Under the measure, principals could choose one or more staff members to carry a gun in the school. They would be required to complete training, including firearms proficiency, similar to that required of licensed armed guards, said bill sponsor Rep. Greg Steube, R-Sarasota.Lawmakers will consider the bill in the 60-day legislative session scheduled to begin Tuesday as they weigh improving school security following the mass killing at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., last December.Steube's bill faces an uphill climb, given the controversy of having armed personnel other than law enforcement in public schools.National Rifle Association spokesman Wayne LaPierre provoked criticism late last year after suggesting armed guards in schools."I do not believe the solution is to add more guns in the classroom," said Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg, in response to Steube's bill. "It doesn't excite me a whole lot for children's safety that teachers are strapping-up to prepare for the bad man coming in."Steube, whose father is Manatee County Sheriff Brad Steube, said he introduced the legislation because, while high schools in Manatee and Sarasota counties have armed deputies on campus, known as school resource officers, middle schools in the two counties share the officers, while elementary schools have none."We have a problem when we have a gun-free zone, and people with mental illness know they can go into an elementary school and there's no one there to defend them," Greg Steube said. "If something were to occur, there would be someone there who could respond to it in a reasonable amount of time because they're there on the campus."Steube said his plan "gives a lot of flexibility to our principals. No one knows better who would want or can handle this responsibility better than the principals."Although other lawmakers, including Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, are talking about efforts to arm school personnel, lawmakers appear to be putting more effort into providing additional funding to improve school safety. Sen. Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton, chairman of the Senate subcommittee that oversees education funding, has held two hearings on the topic of school safety and funding for improvements.Costs for the officers and how they are covered vary across the state. Staffing each school in the state with a resource officer would cost tens of millions of dollars. Legislators also have talked about fortifying campus security.Rouson said an alternative solution to Steube's proposal could be taking "bad assault weapons out of the hands of bad people." But he has not offered a specific alternative, saying he is researching school safety in the hopes of assembling other ideas.In Sarasota County, only law enforcement officers can carry firearms onto any campus, said to Darrell Reyka, the school district's director of safety and security."I think the training component is critical," Reyka said."Law enforcement officers are the best trained and most qualified to deal with an active shooter at a school."Meanwhile, the state's self-defense law would say people can fire warning shots to fend off attackers without fear of prosecution under a bill now before legislators.Freshman Rep. Neil Combee, R-Polk City, filed a bill that would make it clear that people who fire warning shots — or simply show their gun to scare away any would-be attacker but don't actually shoot someone — could be protected from harsher penalties that they could otherwise face under criminal gun laws.